>> this week, heather mcgee, os sheent of dem received a call from gary civic hello, a white man from north carolina. heather mcgee talks about the interaction and friendship with mr. civic hello and what he's done to change his views. demos?her, what is demos is a public

toicy organization dedicated the idea that each of us should have an equal say in our democracy. what we've been thinking about is the root of our name. root word of the root word of the people, which is the root word of democracy, and right now it feels like wh figuring out who belongs in our nation's demos. host: i woke up on december 10, 2016, picked up "the new york times," and saw the headline, "i'm prejudiced, he said. then we kept talking." video andshow you the then ask you to explain the whole thing. >> good morning. i was hoping your guest could help me change my mind about some things. i am a white male, and i am prejudiced. the reason it is is something

not that i was taught but something i learned. when i open up the papers, i get discouraged with what young black males are doing to each other and the crime rates. i understand they live in an environment with a lot of drugs. you have to get money for drugs. it's a deep issue that goes beyond that. i have these different fears. i don't want my fears to come true. i try to avoid that. prejudiced.s being i don't like being forced to like people. i like being led to like people through example. what can i do to change, to be a better american?

heather: thank you so much for being honest and opening up this conversation, because it is one of the most important ones we need to have in this country. host: you said more, but i will let you tell us what happened after that. heather: that was a remarkable moment. i didn't realize until i stepped off the set. there were more calls after that. we just had to keep rolling. how powerful it was. there was something in his voice that touched me. you can hear it. it is so authentic as he searches for the words to say something to a national audience of many of us won't admit in our homes, i am prejudiced. the way he ended his question saying, what can i do to change and be a better american, reached right in and grabbed my heart. i had to just pause, and it felt like the set fell away and i was trying to communicate with his person who reached a hand out to me. ,es, he said some things that

as the sister of a black man, daughter of a black man, were painful to hear, and i knew there were many more layers of stereotypes underneath what he said, but at the same time, i know we are all swimming in a sea of racist stereotypes. the media only represents black crime, and it's become the aim of a lot of politicians actually to make people distrust one another and particularly distrust people of color. could i blame him for absorbing that particularly when he was asking for things to change? i had to thank him. host: what happened next? heather: i work in law and public policy. before the call, i have been talking about student loans and trade policy. yes, i have been talking about race relations, but as an instrument to talk about public policy.

i could tell that gary really wanted simple answers to his questions about how he could integrate his life. head, i said, my get to know black families, and if you are a religious person, join in interracial church. people of different races in a sense of common purpose. i did tell him to turn off the nightly news because we know there is a warped vision of who commits crimes in this country. that comes in many media markets . i asked him to read about black history. i got a sense of who he was talking about was black people, stereotypes against immigrants, muslims, but with his question, he was asking me, the black to tell his television, him how to overcome prejudice

against black people. host: then what? heather: then i kept going with the program. i walked off the set, and i had a text message from my colleague gwen, and she had watched it. she was there with another one of my colleagues. she's a young white woman from the south. he's a young african-american man from the south, as well. they looked at each other with tears in their eyes and said, something special just happened. , they put it on facebook. by monday, it had about one million views. a bunch of different other sites and video aggregators picked it up and put different headings on became a "racist is c-span caller asks of this black woman a question and here's her

response," and it went viral. you had comedians and public figures talking about it. is an organization that works in public policy. the people who follow us online our walks and nerds, people who care about the specific issues we work on, like debt-free college or democracy reform. this was getting out there. my sister-in-law's hairdresser said, i saw that. it was starting to really break .ut of the bubble this is august. we had a racially charged summer with donald trump's campaign with black lives matter and the police shootings and the tragic events all in baton rouge and dallas. it was a time when people felt like all they were seeing on tv about race was bad news, and here was first, a white man

admitting that he was prejudice, which, for people of color, we all just said, finally. you had donald trump saying that mexican immigrants are racist and saying, i don't have a prejudice bone in my body. here was this everyday guys saying, yeah, i have these prejudices. >> we found this video on your website. tell us how this happened. i went down to north carolina, and i met with gary. we furthered that conversation about race and asked each of their hard questions. it was amazing. >> when you get to know people, don't let it go by. my insecurities, they must have

the same thing. if you don't practice in taking that first step, it's the hardest thing. host: how did you find gary? heather: gary found me. gary, a few days later, was watching tv. he was watching cnn. i went on cnn and had an interview about the fact that viral, so het heard my voice again. he had never seen or heard me before the c-span show. he heard my voice and ran into the living room and saw me talking about the clip, and at the bottom, it had my twitter handle. gary went on his computer and went on twitter for his first time in his life. how does tweet said, this thing work? he entered in my twitter handle and said, i'm gary from north

carolina. i wanted to know. the way those shows work, i gave my answer, and then we went onto another call. i didn't know if he brushed it off. i didn't know anything about who he was. there's no way to know. he found me and said, i'm gary from north carolina. i sent him a direct private message and said, gary, i would love to talk to you about what you thought about my answer to your question. i gave him my phone number. a few days later, i got a phone call, and he was sitting at a burger joint having a lunch --ak, and he decided to have connie. he was very nervous. i was very nervous. he said, what you said changed my life. to which i was shocked. i thought, sure, when asked a pretty hard question off the top of my head, i gave decent

answers, but i didn't think it was going to be something he would take so seriously. he explained to me that he is .ow on a path he wanted to get right about this before he died. he said he was inspired by the fact newspapers across the viral on social media, and it was picked up in the normal press. he said, there are probably a lot of other people like me out there who have these fears and are worriedand about what will happen to them if they admit it. host: when did you go down there and why? heather: we had a couple phone conversations. the first one was so good, he thanked me, i thanked him for his courage. he said some version of what we said in the video. he said, i don't know what you want to do with this, but it

seems like a big thing, and if you are willing to keep talking about this, he said, i'm willing to talk with you about it. he said, use me to keep this conversation going, because the country needs it. i kind of took that to heart. i didn't know exactly what would come of it. then i got married, actually. then my life -- i went away from my work for a while. i talked to gary once more before i was getting ready for my wedding. he told me the books he was reading. i gave him some ideas. he had gone to the bookstore to get some african-american studies books. he sent me a video of himself and the heading for the african-american studies section of the bookstore to tell me he was in the bookstore, and then i got the invitation to go speak at wake forest university with melissa harris-perry.

said, let'snd and i call gary and see if we can drive and meet with him. we did that. gary and i were very nervous to meet each other. we had no idea what would happen. my husband is a documentary filmmaker, so i said, gary, i think we should record us meeting. he said, absolutely. that footage was filmed by my husband. it was a really beautiful conversation in person. it exceeded my expectations. host: where is that you go heather:heather: he lives outside of asheville, north carolina. he wanted us to meet in nashville. -- asheville. downtowntside in asheville. it was a beautiful fall day, changing leaves. it was about a week before the

election, and we didn't talk about the election much. we didn't talk about politics. he told me about his life. we got to know each other, where he's from, the experiences he has had. host: how old is the man? heather: i think he is mid 50's. host: where is he from? heather: he was born in connecticut, new haven connecticut, but hughes in the navy and had a heart condition and went to asheville. this is one of those beautiful things that happens in american ories where the same things he was afraid of in terms of the media stereotypes of africa america have been part of his experience in connecticut with gangs, drug

addiction, and when he got his , he fell in love with asheville and the slow pace of life. now he's mostly retired. host: is he married? heather: no. host: no children. how often in your life have you heard -- you can't quantify -- how often have you heard the as a white man? heather: it is a pretty innumerable count. in terms of someone saying that to me personally, probably not so many times. career, i started out as an economic policy person and would go across the country in

my role at demos and in other talking with people about the economy. a lot of times in church basements, union halls, talking about, what has happened in our economy so that working people are finding it so hard to get ahead? i could tell that story without talking about race at all. i could talk about globalization and technological change, corporate power and trade rules and tax rules and workers rights. i felt if i didn't mention race, i was not telling the whole story. some piece of puzzle -- the puzzle was missing. how was it that my grandfather's generation, you could have a working-class job, didn't have to go to college, and you had a great job with benefits, retirement security, and public

schools were well-funded and you could go to college debt-free? something changed in the late 1970's. yes, there are lots of reasons for that change, but something also shifted in our politics where the very idea of a government that invests in its people and supports working-class folks and supports investments in mobility has racialized.d, the conservative vision of government carries on these stereotypes. it felt to me like i was getting drawn into more and more conversations about race even when i was supposed to be to a laid-off worker about the economy. peopleed to talk with

about race to see their own self interest in it. host: tell us where you were born. heather: i was born in chicago. i was born and raised in the south side of chicago. host: your parents did what? heather: my mother come at the time i was born, she was and is -- a holistic health practitioners and ended up moving int more social policy. my father was an artist and photographer. host: were they together? they were together. heather: they got divorced when i was young. , lived between both of them had a great community i grew up in, the michelle obama southside that people know. my grandparents on both sides had come up from the south and worked in the public sector as a cop and social worker. it was a great way to grow up. what about the people in

your high school? heather: i grew up in mostly all-black schools until i went away to boarding school. this was a decision my mom made in seventh grade, pretty early. i went from growing up in to virtually all-white, rural, new england school. host: what school? heather: it's called the mint. very small school. i was in western massachusetts and one of two black children in the entire school. that was a pretty phenomenal adjustment. i was young. i was 11. young for even seventh grade. in some ways, being that young helped. and have me be a child a sense of adventure about this incredible culturaladjustment. i was young. i shift i just experienced. in my high school i went to, it

was a diverse but very elite prep school. most of the kids of color were ones who came in on scholarships. host: where was that? heather: just outside of boston. host: how were you treated when you were 11 years old by the white girls? heather: it was hard. we were kids. in some ways, we were just young enough to have a little bit of that childhood in since -- innocence. some of the harsher status concerns that come in high school, we were before that, but there were a lot of moments where they just didn't understand some of the basic things about being black and young. i went from living with my family to living with all white parents.hite dorm

little things about the way i grip compared to how they grew up came up, but i developed wonderful friends. going from a big public school to a tiny school where they sat around with five teachers and a book -- i'm sorry, five students, a book, and a teacher. in some ways, it was very fortunate. host: were your parents wealthy? heather: no, but they were able to use financial aid. it was a big leap that my parents made to say i wasn't getting the challenge i needed in public school. host: one of the things people noticed when you answered gary and the show, there was not an ounce of anger in your voice. when did you learn how to do that? heather: i'm angry about race a

free day. you: but i mean in the way treat other people, how do you get this even temperament? heather: i went to the obama school. [laughter] i'm kidding. host: what does that mean? heather: there's the joke about the obama anger translator. he has to do it all the time. the amount of disrespect thrown at him, the amount of vitriol, he has had to rise above it. that is what it means to be president of the united states. host: how do you do it? you've obviously done it. heather: there has to be, to be a person of color in a , you-dominant society learn how -- at least, i learned how to have empathy first.

gary's question was extraordinary. it's different when someone is racist to me in the line at a store. he was saying, i am prejudiced, and i need to change. it comes back to this idea of, is racism and prejudice something that is an individual evil, or is it something that is baked into the fabric of this and that is communicated in subtle messages every single day in our media? if we believe as most racial justice advocates do that it's not theer, that it's story of evil sinners and good people, but rather a system that communicate a belief and hierarchy of human

, people absorb that belief. i'm not saying that takes the blame away from everyone, but it means when someone identifies admit theying to absorbed a bunch of pretty racist stereotypes about our fellow americans admit they absorbed a bunch, should we answer that call? i think we have to. i think we all have to. one of the big mistakes with the way this culture has shifted lifetimecourse of my is we stopped talking about race and admitting that in fact is far, far more common than we want to acknowledge. host: how many times have you been with gary? heather: i talk with gary on the phone about a dozen times. i've met with him in person now three times. host: what is the future of the gary-heather relationship? heather: i don't know.

he is on this incredible journey that i am from time to time sign posting for him. he created this system on his own where he forced himself to interact with people of color he normally would not have. he started it in the waiting room at the v.a. wear a black man sat next to him, and he created a system for himself where he said, my assumption about this person on a scale of 1-10 is that i'm not going to like them. we would have a bad interaction. i'm afraid of him. i'm anxious. we put it low on the scale. say,he forced himself to really bad traffic on i-91 or whatever, some kind of opening salvo, and after the interaction, he would rate how he felt about him afterwards.

there was always a 5, 6, 7-point spread. not something i would've come up do, -- andsen to chosen to do, but in some ways, it is disarmingly simple. the basic spirit of it is come if you've got to the point where not only do you consume a lot of stereotypes on television but in your life, you are finding that it's affecting who you feel comfortable sitting next to or talking to, sending your children to school with, paying taxes to support their education, living near, we've got work to do. classi want to talk about , because this may be an example. when you look at your background, what happened after high school? echodid you study heather: american studies. heather:then i went to law

school at uc berkeley. host: how did all of that happen? that's an expensive ride. heather: just debt. host: why were you interested in going to yale and getting a law degree echo what was moving you? heather: i've always wanted -- .hat community in chicago there was a sense growing up that you pay for living on the earth. something,d to do whether it was work in the public sector, work in a nonprofit. i never questioned the idea that in some ways making this country better was going to be the work of my life. host: after law school, where did you go then? heather: i started working at demos just after college.

position inry-level the economic opportunity program. the organization had only been around a year and a half or two years. i got a job. i had some jobs during college working, doing research for a small public policy organization. able to get this job working on the issue of debt. able to get this job working on thewe will working oe of credit card debt and payday loans have become this plastic savings plan for working class americans. at demoson that issue for number of years and decided to go to law school. host: the reason i bring -- bring up class, how much

education did gary have? heather: i don't think he finished college. navy.and he was in the he must've had reactions with people who did it look like him. about that ad talk little bit with him. that surprised me. we think of the military as the most integrated institution in our society, but i think -- that was a long time ago for him. has in many ways just lived the life of a in the south.guy north carolina has a very diverse political landscape and everything. it became clear in conversations that among friends, racist jokes were just part of the way they communicated and entertained themselves. host: tell us about demos, the

organization. how many people work there? how much money do you spend a year? heather: demos demos is 16 years old and we have grown with 60 folks. i became president three years ago. rappaportfrom miles who went on to become the president of common cause. miles, hek over for guy.mid-60's, white i grew up with the organization and i came back in 2009. there was not a ton that i wanted to do to change it. to raise the understanding of all of our the economist to the

political science and the lawyers. of how race affects us all. the biggest thing i did to transform the organization was racialrk on a three-year organization process. the organization is predominately white or it it was much more so when i took over. that conversation about race with white people was something we took on head on at the organization. host: what is the most offensive thing a white person can say to you? heather: can say to me? to yourself, there he goes, that is the signal. most pernicious lie -- i sayple of color it is the most pernicious because it is invasive and core

to undermining the sense of social solidarity and a shared contract that is essential for our country. is thet pernicious lie, lie that people of color, black people, immigrants are, in some -- do not want the same things that everybody else wants. lazy, note intelligent. any kind of -- not deserving of any kind of the same kind of support that made flourish middle-class in the middle of the century. it is that idea that -- for example, we see it in health care today. there is so much of this prejudice undertone in the conversation about taking away

seen byicare, which is many folks, particularly white folks. older white people have earned and put money aside to give free things to undeserving people who just do not deserve it, basically. the communities of color that i grew up among, that i know are so seldom in the popular imagination among white people. particularly those who watch a lot of conservative media. where there is a very clear racial narrative. the stories that are cherry -- in some wise it is donald trump's vision of black america. you have nothing to loose, every shooting people

day, families are broken, all of the immigrants who come to the country are rapists and immigrants. that idea tears at the fabric of the country. how are you supposed to hear that message about communities that you do not live near, then say, yes i think those kids should have health care subsidies. i think we should raise all of our taxes so that college is debt-free for those community college students. it is a very slippery slope from a stereotype that is at an individual basis to tearing apart the sense of who we all are as americans. it comes back and affects white people too. host: going back to the video from our call in show, it was 8 million at one point. you know what the number is now? heather: it was 8 million before the new york times got there. i am sure it is much more now. host: what has happened to you

as a result of this? rough fall.was a i was in north carolina meeting with gary the week before the election. personally,, for me and for many other people who dedicated their lives to social justice, racial justice and economic justice, the election of a billionaire who spouted a andof disdain, distrust, discussed for many members of the american community was a pretty rough, and continues to be a pretty rough proposition. -- whotionship with gary should be a trump voter by demographics. he is not a democrat, as he told me when we first met her at he did not vote for -- trump -- fit

met. he did not vote for trump. he has become someone who recognized his own stereotypes. it was almost joy for him to catch it. he shifted his consciousness to a more better idea of who americans are. host: i guarantee you people are watching this right now, it will affect them. you know why, and you will know immediately. who is the chairman of your board? heather: i thought you were going to say you are prejudice. i was so excited we would do something care. i do want to say, we are all prejudice. have stereotypes and hold .tereotypes for some people it may be about muslims. for some people it may be about immigrants, women, or obese people. host: you know why i asked this

question? when you tell us who the chairman, people listening will go, one way or the other. , who is thelia daughter and collaborator on a number of books with elizabeth warren, the senator from massachusetts. it is her daughter. not only is it her. her, but they actually work together on a number of books, including the e trap.om that is how i got to know elizabeth warren when she was a professor. this argument we were making about credit card debt and how the rules had changed and was drowning working families. it was one that she and amelia are making in the early 2000 spirit that is why we got to know each other. i have always been a fan of senator warren. had ar warren and i have number of conversations about race.

about how you talk about the economic populism she delivers so compellingly, and also told that missing piece of the story of how race has been used as a weapon in the war to drive people who have common class interests. donald trumpident called you and said i would like to meet with you, would you? heather: that is so interesting. when i was in north carolina and i met with melissa harris-perry, we had a conversation. she said if hillary clinton called, would you work for the white house? i said no, i love him doing that demos. trumphe said if donald called and said i want you to lead my racial reconciliation, would you do it? in your hypotheticals, i don't know why he is calling me. host: he is calling you because he want you to come to the oval

office, by yourself, he will have nobody there and you get to sit with him, no drama and or cameras and he will say tell me why it is black folks dislike me. and what can i do about it. heather: i would have a lot to theto donald trump about story he holds in his mind about people of color in this country, and how dangerous it is for de as, for our sense of being whole people in our country. i have a lot to say to donald trump, i would be happy to say. the eye, look him in you will tell him things. let's just assume he is saying i'm not prejudice. i can't say this out loud, but this is part of the act. thater: i would tell him he has created lasting damage.

his incredible megaphone that he has used to reify some of the worst stereotypes about immigrants, muslims, women, people with disabilities, african-americans. host: how deep is it? damaging,t is so here's why. he was able to connect one of the most significant crisis of our time. the decline in living standards, particularly among people without a college degree. the fact that you cannot work your way out of poverty today. towas able to connect that scapegoating people of color. -- particularly for those of us who have dedicated our whole lives to trying to call

the country's attention and call the elite's attention to what has happened to the working and middle classes countries, making a, votingon to that, for someone who says i alone can fix it, as opposed to saying it is about collective action. it made the middle class in this country and transform dangerous factory jobs into good jobs through collective action and collective bargaining, which he is opposed to. the fact that he made tied the concern about the decline and good jobs in america to violent encouraging scapegoating. litmus tests for coming into the country are -- onon religion. religion.

it is devastating and it will last longer than the donald trump presidency. folkswhy are most black so anti-a black person who is a conservative? carson, they do not speak for me, it is a big negative on them. heather: in some ways i feel like it is similar to white folks who are against elizabeth warren. it is about the politics. i wish the conservative ideology to create aasy division among racial lines. race has been -- racism has been so central to the policy solutions, and the stories about the country. it is really hard.

when you get an african-american, or a latina, or any person of color who gets into political life and wants to start the enforcement of civil rights, wants to abolish the minimum wage, wants to bust aions, which are even more of ticket to the middle class for working black folks and latinos because the job discrimination is so strong outside of the union. it is not about race, it is about the policies and the ideas of what they have done and will do to the communities. o'reilly talked about race on his show december 20, 2016. it was about white privilege. i want you to hear it and react to it. very few commentators will to you that the heart of liberalism in america today is

based on race. .t permeates almost every issue that white men have set up a system of oppression. that system must be destroyed. bernie sanders said that. hillary clinton did. the liberal media tries to sell that all day long. badalled white privilege, diversity, good. host: yes. heather: sure. privilege based on race is bad and diversity is good. isial and ethnic diversity the source of american exceptionalism. the fact that we are a country -- we were not to send it from one ethnic group as european country was. our immigration laws have created a place where there is someone here in the united

states with ties to every single the thing thats makes us exceptional and extraordinary. yes, diversity is good. privilege that is based on skin color is not democratic, --is not a gala terrien are most white supremacists -- heather: those are two very different questions. host: what do black people say about white people when we are not around? heather: that is a good question. -- i am trying to think of an actual example. host: there has to be things you say. ? heather: sure. our country -- we have this very double sense in

--s country where we admit and generally 15th on martin luther king day our country was legally racially segregated up until recently, but the footage is black and white. we really do not want to that, that has some affect on our -- all of our systems. it really is about the beliefs. whiteis this idea that people who were racist before the civil rights movement, maybe they were just bad people. we know that is not actually true. vast majority of white americans tolerated a system of apartheid in our country and does that mean that they were evil and would

literally kill a black person before they would sit next to them? obviously not. if that is the truth, how can we that the understand beliefs about -- and they have different justifications now. it may not be biology, it may be that black culture is inferior. of course there are some good black people. i really want to make sure that we don't fall into that trap. it was very easy to do so when you had an african-american family in the white house. it is not all black people, it is just the culture of so many, and too many black people. host: i want to go back to more video, this is from april 30, 20 15th at the white house correspondents dinner. i will ask you more when you hear what he says. live in your time mr.

president, when a black man can lead the entire free world. [applause] >> words alone mean no justice. so mr. president, i will keep it 100, at yelp berry, you did it my n-word. thank you very much, good night. [applause] add to this, ist recently saw that movie fences. the n-word is used a tremendous amount along the black folks in the movie. what should white people react to this use? -- whenck false use it black folks use it, bad, when

white folks use it, really bad good -- bad. one of the difficulties of understanding race relations is the need to understand the quality and -- understand the quality. uality. different communities are situated differently. there is a power differential among the communities in this country. i personally do not use that word. grew up and we did not use that word. at the same time, i know that a lot of people have defended it because it is reclaiming a word when used by white people is used with hate, division, disrespect. and when used by people of color, the intent, as you can

tell by larry wilmore think it to the president was not hate, division and disrespect. what is the meaning behind the word? what is the intent of the word? it is obviously very different. thinking -- the understanding that if you are going to be in a society that has a lot of different communities, and frankly that has communities that have different power differentials. i may not have a massive power differential, except for the fact that you are -- asking the questions and i am answering them. as a young african-american --an, as an older white man, i do not say old. there are power differentials there. you're the one with a law degree from uc berkeley. heather: there will always be

exceptions. the wealth of a white man. tick --e 10 times the typical wealth of an african-american household. that is still the case when it comes to white and black families of equal education, because of the history of racial segregation and wealth stripping. the thing that is challenging, but not so challenging, and gary has been able to really understand it and make it a part of the way he now sees the world . there are group dynamics. you and i are incredibly idiosyncratic, individual people with our foibles and stories. if you lay all white men, african-american women, latina out, and look at the

way they have power. who's represented in the senate and the congress. 90% of the elected officials in the country are still white. two thirds are white men. if you look at the difference of wealth and income, the ability to walk into a room to get a job and call back if you have an african-american sounding name but no criminal record, you are less likely to get a call back for a job and if you are a white person who has a criminal record. does that mean that i cannot get a job, or that any white person will always get a job? does mean these group dynamics still exist and we have to acknowledge them. host: are your parents alive? heather: yes. host: what do they think of your success? my mother, we have dedicated her life and career to racial healing.

she lives outside of maryland. my grandfather is not still alive and he was a chicago police officer. was very close to harold washington -- first black mayor of chicago. i wish you was still alive. he would have a lot to say. my dad is in sacramento. host: so, where did you meet your husband? heather: i met my husband in high school. host: and his name is? heather: shepherd. he is a perfectly american story. his mother was a foreign exchange student from pakistan and met her husband, my husband's father in school. incrediblyhis unlikely love story. he was a white american from denver and she was a pakistani woman.

interface,in this intercultural family. host: so you have a mixed marriage? heather: yes. host: any of your own black folks resent that? don't want whites to marry blacks. what is it like from the black immunity? -- community? there are prejudices in every community. i would just say that prejudice in the white community is backed up often by the force of law and the economy. more towhy it matters the state of black children that white people are prejudice. more than if a black woman is prejudice against white people. i will say that i fortunately -- my marriage has been in brace much by my community and his

community. host: those who may have tuned gary is who?ate, gary said he was a white man and i him prejudice. that is how he opened up his call on c-span. host: he changed since that call with you. heather: tremendously. on a personal level, this is someone who spent most of his time watching tv and did not have many interactions with people. he has really pushed himself to interact with people of different races. he has been flown to d.c. and new york to meet with me. he has been interviewed for the new yorker magazine and on cnn last week or it more importantly, he is taking it on truthf to learn about the about race and racism in the

country. host: here is a little bit from that cnn. the fellow that interview is on your board? heather: van jones, yes. van: how are they reacting? think they are curious. i think they are wondering what i have gotten myself into. i have a few friends that i can count on my hand. i told them i was doing this thing and had this new friend who mentors me. was a long time ago, i had a different kind of conversation with them. host: is there more to do on the story? demos with the heather: i think so. for about a year now i have been wanting to write a book.

the -- i started working on the book proposal before the facebook call with gary. the idea of the book is to really catalog the different ways that racism is actually bad for white people. host: will you write it for whites and blacks? andher: for white people people of color who are trying to find common cause. gary was in a lot of pain. the degree of anxiety and fear that he had, coupled with the moral gilts. one of the things that really them --m this year was the murder in trust in. murder of innocent people in mother and manual church. anuelreally -- mother emm church.

that really bothered him. he thought about his own prejudice views and racist jokes he told. he said, if i don't do something about this, i will have a stroke. it really caused him pain. i do not think that any of us, as americans get away scott free with racism still being the cancer that it is in our society. host: heather mckie, president of the demos organization. www.demos.com host: thank you for joining us. ♪ >> for free transcripts are to

give us your comments about this program, visit us at q and a.org. q and a programs are available at c-span podcast. >> if you enjoyed this week's , here are some other programs you might like. news with contributing editor, talks about his career and writing about race issues. author and lecturer nathan mccall discussing race relations and his collection of essays on social issues. and ceo of the naacp talking about race relations in the u.s.. or can watch these anytime, search our entire video library at c-span.org.

c-span's washington journal, live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. coming up monday morning, real clear politics white house correspondent will give a preview of the week ahead for the trump administration. sam talksction forms about the trump administration's efforts to overhaul the federal rulemaking process, and produce the number of and cost of regulations. and new york times reporter discusses what faces the trump administration as it proposes fortifying the barrier along the southern order. be sure to watch c-span's washington journal live at 7:00 a.m. eastern monday morning. join the discussion. prime ministerh theresa may takes questions from

members of the house of commons. former cia director talks about the role of interpreters in iraq and afghanistan. and at 11:00 p.m., another chance to see q and a with ofther mcghee, president demos. on wednesday, british prime minister theresa may discussed her recent visit to the united states, and her meeting with president trump and his executive order on refugees and immigrants entering the u.s.. she also discussed brexit and to government decision pardon lgbt persons convicted of sodomy crimes. this is almost 40 minutes. questions to the prime minister? miss >> --mber one question number when mr. speaker. p.m. may: